WOODY PLANTS
Manual of Woody Landscape Plants (by Michael A. Dirr) Champaign, IL: Stipes Publishing, 1998 (5th edition (6th edition 2006)

 
For many this is the ?bible? for growing shrubs and trees.  The information is encyclopaedic, accurate and easy to use.  Dirr?s writing style is entertaining and his experience with woody plant material is vast.  The volume is a bit weighty at over 1000 pages, but paperback editions are available and the information on identification, landscape use and propagation is invaluable.  While the 5th edition is well worth acquiring, the 6th edition promises major revisions and expanded material on species and cultivars.


Growing Trees from Seed (by Henry Kock with Paul Aird, John Ambrose and Gerald Waldron).  Richmond Hill: Firefly Books, 2008.

This book is much more than another "how-to? book for growing plants from seed. Henry Kock, who worked as an interpretive horticulturalist at the University of Guelph?s Arboretum, spends the first quarter of the book discussing plant identification in the wild, the value of understanding forest ecology and the importance to gardeners of the variation within a species (and its seed) over geographical regions. He then details general methods for collecting, cleaning, storing and planting seeds from trees and shrubs of the Great Lake region. Caring for seedlings for the years until they are established is also addressed, a feature often missing from germination guides. Completing this section is an essay, "Restoring the Landscape?, that tackles climate change, ways to think about exotic/invasive species, and a plea for conserving genetic diversity.




Trees in Canada (by John Laird Farrar) Markham: Fitzhenry and Whiteside, 1995.

This excellent guide covers all native trees in Canada as well as exotic species that have spread into the landscape (e.g., Buckthorn, Weeping Willow, Norway Maple, etc.)  There are also species that occupy that shadowy zone between shrub and tree depending on growing conditions (e.g., Sumac and Elderberry).  Each species has a detailed entry with line drawings, photographs, descriptions, range maps and quick recognition features.  Keys for groups of genera and winter twig identification are included.